07-02-2002 14:43									#1
	World size settings are suboptimal, and how to adjust them Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

Ever wondered why you *always* have some highly corrupt cities? Ever wondered why you often seem to meet the AI very quickly? Ever had trouble doing research on a large map?

I have been examining world sizes with a small spreadsheet I have created (see attachment) and I have found that the numbers are not optimum.

First, some mathematics:

Given:

• X and Y are the dimensions of the world
  
• C is the number of civilizations

Attachment: civ3.zip
This has been downloaded 3 time(s).

Last edited by star mouse on 07-02-2002 at 15:22

	07-02-2002 14:49									#2
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Some more comments:

* Corruption will be more of a problem for you if you select 60% oceans. This is because there's more land area for cities

* Corruption will also affect you if you play with less than the maximum number of civs or kill off some civs in the game

* I have tested the settings on a tiny world by creating a few maps in the editor. In each map I created, the civs were well spaced, so it would have been possible to expand for some time before encountering another civ, even on a tiny map. The four civs tended to have starting positions in the corners.

	07-02-2002 16:50									#3
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For a world of 100x100, there are actually 5,000 squares, not 10,000. That is, G = X * y / 2.

Open up the editor and check if you don't believe me.

	08-02-2002 07:31									#4
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quote: Originally posted by OneInTen For a world of 100x100, there are actually 5,000 squares, not 10,000. That is, G = X * y / 2.

Looks like I'll have to take a look at that because it will obviously throw all the calculations off. You'd think a 100 x 100 map would have 10,000 squares, but no, isometric decides it's going to be tricky....

	09-02-2002 05:41									#5
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When the calculations are re-run after dividing the land by two, number of cities drops, science drops and minimum distance doesn't change much.

You can also fudge the figures easily, so you can still use the figures I gave. Assuming one city per 21 tiles and science points to be 5 times the number of cities are fudges I used that can easily be changed as needed.

Another note: there seems to be a bug in map generation because I have often found civilizations placed closer together than the minimum distance, even with the old distances. In one game I had with the old figures, Paris and Berlin were only 6 squares apart on a large map, and another civ was also nearby.

Last edited by star mouse on 09-02-2002 at 05:51

	09-02-2002 14:41									#6
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quote: Originally posted by star mouse When the calculations are re-run after dividing the land by two, number of cities drops, science drops and minimum distance doesn't change much. You can also fudge the figures easily, so you can still use the figures I gave. Assuming one city per 21 tiles and science points to be 5 times the number of cities are fudges I used that can easily be changed as needed.

I suggest to calculate with 30% land, as this is the standard setting. Furthermore (and also on 'continent' maps), the majority of cities will have at least some sea tiles within their radius; from my own test games, one city per 15 land tiles seems to be a solid assumption.

As for the optimal number of cities ... IMO, one has to decide how many times bigger an empire should be allowed to grow compared to an average-sized one before corruption becomes rampant. Assuming a factor of 2, you'll get your original figures.